The envelope gets political

摘要

The envelope is the separation between inside and outside, the frontier between public and private realms. It regulates the internal environment, provides security and operates as a representation to the outside world. In his essay The Politics of the Envelope, Foreign Office Architects' Alejandro Zaera-Polo explores what he sees as the huge potential in the envelope for political expression.rnHe argues that in the past, attempts to politicise architecture have emerged from the idea of it as an embodiment of political concepts. The modern city however is built and run by corporations for multinational shareholders' interests and the opportunity for architectural representation of any political ideal is often limited.